numerous buildings were brought from far. Hewn stones were imported from
the "land of the Amorites," limestone and alabaster from the Lebanon,
gold-dust and acacia-wood from the desert to the south of Palestine,
copper from northern Arabia, and various sorts of wood from the Armenian
mountains. Other trees came from Dilmun in the Persian Gulf, from Gozan
in Mesopotamia, and from Gubin, which is possibly Gebal. The bitumen was
derived from "Madga in the mountains of the river Gurruda," in which
some scholars have seen the name of the Jordan, and the naphtha springs
of the vale of Siddim.

The library of Gudea has been found entire, with its 30,000 tablets or
books arranged in order on its shelves, and filled with information
which it will take years of labour to examine thoroughly. Not long after
his death, the Second dynasty of Ur gave way to a Third, this time of
Semitic origin. Its kings still claimed that sovereignty over Syria and
Palestine which had been won by Sargon. One of them, Inê-Sin, carried
his arms to the west, and married his daughters to the "high-priests" of
Ansan in Elam, and of Mer'ash in northern Syria. His grandson,
Gimil-Sin, marched to the ranges of the Lebanon and overran the land of
Zamzali, which seems to be the Zamzummim of Scripture.

But with Gimil-Sin the strength of the dynasty seems to have come to an
end. Babylonia was given over to the stranger, and a dynasty of kings
from southern Arabia fixed its seat at Babylon. The language they spoke
and the names they bore were common to Canaan and the south of Arabia,
and sounded strangely in Babylonian ears. The founder of the dynasty was
Sumu-abi, "Shem is my father," a name in which we cannot fail to
recognise the Shem of the Old Testament. His descendants, however, had
some difficulty in extending and maintaining their authority. The native
princes of southern Babylonia resisted it, and the Elamites harried the